Share Your Knowledge

Promote your course by sharing your knowledge

Once you’ve discovered where your students are online and started engaging with them, you’ll be able to naturally start promoting your course. It’s important to keep creating value for the community as you start to sell to them. Remember that for each time that you mention your own course, you want to interact at least three times without selling anything. Having a balance ensures you don’t seem pushy and keeps your audience interested.

Resources

What instructors say

“Create a Youtube video where you help solve a problem that your audience faces. Something basic and broad spectrum. Then at the end tell them you have more great quality information surrounding this topic in your Udemy course in the link below!” – Robert M.

“Find bloggers with good followings in your industry and offer them free access to your course in exchange for a public review on their blog. Also, get actively involved in Quora and answer questions to help solve problems related to your expertise and mention your course when appropriate.” – Erikka F.

Put your course materials to work

Use your supporting materials. Place your slides, course resources, or exercises on SlideShare or other social platforms and ask a question to generate conversation and interest. Don’t forget to include a coupon link to your course.

Put videos on YouTube. Post one of your lectures to YouTube with a coupon so students can see exactly what your course is like.

Collaborate. Ask to be a guest on blogs, YouTube channels, and events by leaders in your industry. They might suggest the topic, and you can work in your materials. Ask them to link to your course in exchange.

What instructors say

“Go to quora.com, find your course related questions with upvotes and answer them. Then send the answer as an educational announcement to existing students. Also post the answer on social media with course coupons.” – Sivakumar K.

“Hop on a FB Live, and teach the best point in your course for 5 mins. Then, download the video from FB and upload the recording to a dedicated tips YouTube channel. Use PrettyLink (free) to create a simple link to your Udemy course coupon – read that link out at the end of the 5 mins (and say at the beginning of your Live that you’ll reveal it).” – Paul J.

“I like to create e-books of my Udemy lecture notes and then publish them on Amazon. I enroll in the Amazon KDP program and then once or twice every 3 months as Amazon lets me, I give the books away as lecture notes to my students for free. Advertising the free books on other platforms as well when doing this also brings in some new course signups.” – Dan G.

Write effective emails and social posts

Make an appealing subject line or headline. The goal is to get someone to open your email or click your link. It’s not a place to be vague, but it is a good way to inject some personality. People react well when you offer them something, appeal to their curiosity, suggest that their help is needed, or address them personally.

Include strategic links. The goal of the rest of the text is to push people to click the link to your course. In email a good rule is to include the link three times, spaced between the beginning, middle and end.

Be authentic. Even when you’re addressing people you don’t know, avoid getting too formal. Write in a personal way, express gratitude, remain humble and show your passion for your subject. Keep punctuation reasonable, though (not too many exclamation marks!).

Make it clear what you want. People shouldn’t be confused by too many links or requests. Make it clear, visually and in writing, what you want them to click and what they stand to gain.

Make it urgent. People who receive a lot of emails or follow a lot of accounts on social media might file your message away and forget to ever address is again. By letting them know that there is an expiration for your coupon codes, or a limited quantity of coupons available, you encourage them to act swiftly.

Make it visual. Attach an image, video, or other piece of valuable information which will help them see what your course provides.

What instructors say

“Go through your course and make bullet points from each section. Copy these into a PDF file, and elaborate on each, add a picture or two also. Then offer this PDF for free in the course description as a ‘bonus’ for enrolling. Also then offer it for free following a signup on your site. Then mention it in a video and share that to social media…. the opportunities are endless once you have ‘something’ of value to give away as an incentive!” – Robin S.

“If a course can result in “visual projects” created by students, you can take those projects and share them on your Instagram and Pinterest.” – Dawid T.

Use social media efficiently

Be consistent. Pick a schedule and stick to it. For example, answer questions on Tuesdays or post a video each Thursday.

Build your personal brand. Your style might change a bit between groups (LinkedIn may be more professional while Facebook is more chatty) but you should strive to keep consistent images, colors, and other branding for yourself.

Twitter is for more than text. Tweets go by quickly. Tell people the percentage discount you’re offering and when they need to act by. Twitter supports both videos and polls, which are great ways to provide information and engage new potential students.

Use your Facebook business page. If you made a business page while identifying your reach then you’ve already got people following what you have to say and can start working in references to your course. If you have some money set aside for advertising, Facebook Ads are also an effective way to gain new followers for your page. Find a quality image and offer a promotion in your headline, while including some sort of expiration to create urgency.

Use YouTube to give course previews. Search to see what the most popular videos are for your target audience using a tool like SocialBlade or Keyword Tool, then see what those videos do well which you could imitate. Upload the beginning of your course, but be careful not to provide too much for free. Include a link to your course with a coupon code within the first two lines of the video description.